Graphic design giant Canva has dramatically entered the professional creative software arena by making its newly acquired Affinity suite, a direct competitor to Adobe’s products, free forever for all users on Windows and Mac.
The move marks an aggressive challenge to established players in the creative industry, shifting the long-standing model of paid subscriptions for professional design tools. Canva has declared that the full suite—comprising Affinity Photo (for raster editing), Affinity Designer (for vector graphics), and Affinity Publisher (for layout design)—will retain all its features without any reduction.
Canva has also rebranded the individual Affinity applications as “Pixel,” “Vector,” and “Layout,” unifying them into a single program. These tools are now compatible with files from Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign, facilitating easier migration for users.
The company aims to integrate Affinity seamlessly into its ecosystem, requiring users to have a Canva account for access. A core benefit for Canva Premium subscribers will be additional features, including AI-powered image generation, advanced editing, and text extraction directly within Affinity.
This development follows a period of speculation about Affinity’s future, which saw its iPad versions offered for free with a deadline of October 30, 2025, and official videos removed from online channels. The current “Free Forever” announcement is designed to reassure users and counter concerns about potential future feature locking, a practice seen in other free software.
Existing users who previously purchased Affinity on any platform will continue to have access to their software. However, Canva has not yet specified whether these legacy users will continue to receive updates or support under the new model.
An iPad version of the free Affinity suite is expected to be released soon. Users who previously claimed the free iPad version before its promotional deadline will continue to have access.
The Affinity suite is currently available for download for 64-bit Windows 10 Version 1909 or higher, and macOS Monterey or higher, supporting both Apple Silicon and Intel chips.